Chapter Text
Wilhelm wishes he could say he was surprised to be standing at his older brother’s front door in Bjärstad but this seemed like the inevitable.
With a suitcase in one hand and his new cell phone in the other, his fist pounded on the door urgently. Almost like he thought his mother had already tracked him down in the four hours he'd been gone.
It took a few seconds for the door to fly open, Erik's eyes wide with alarm before they soften upon seeing his little brother.
The siblings hadn’t seen each other in almost six months, not since Erik up and left and basically fell off Earth as far as their parents were concerned.
“Wilhelm,” Erik says, his voice just like the younger remembered.
He hasn't heard it in person in what felt like years, only hushed on the phone in secret every few weeks. It sounds different, more clear, more soft, than it did through the speaker. It's oddly comforting for seeming so foreign.
“What are you doing here?”
Erik's eyes drop down to the suitcase in his brother's hand, one of the extra large ones they used to bring on their vacations abroad. He fights back an untimely smile thinking about lugging it through the streets of Spain a few years ago.
“Not that I’m not happy to see you… I just…” he continues, when Wilhelm's silence prolongs and he just stares at him. Words are caught in the boy's throat, he can tell that much, and it seems like the reality of what he just did (although Erik himself isn’t too sure yet) is sinking in.
The older man finally moves on impulse, taking the heavy bag from his brother and wrapping him in a tight hug.
Because when it comes to Wilhelm, he’s learned a hug could solve almost anything. Even when they were kids, when you're in a panic to get your younger sibling to stop crying before you get in trouble, a remorseful hug always worked.
Erik notices that, although Wilhelm has grown a few inches, he's skinnier than the last time he saw him. Feels a little too frail.
And now, there’s a scent to his brother that Wille doesn’t recognize - lavender mixed with something so distinctly homey - and he realizes in that moment that their shared, sterile scent of home is gone; for some reason, that’s the thing to break him. There were about ten thousand other things that could have brought Wilhelm to that point tonight but this was the final one.
Wilhelm breaks down in the arms of his brother, whom he missed so dearly, more than he could ever express, and hopes to never be separated from again. Because there was no way in hell he was going back there.
~
(Sara 10:52 pm)
Where are you?
(Simon 10:52 pm)
ayub’s. u ok?
(Sara 10:53 pm)
Come home
“Fuck,” Simon mutters under his breath.
Given the time, day of week, and insistence from Sara to come home, Simon knows this can only mean one thing; even through the loud chatter of Ayub's game, Rosh can sense the change in him. She somehow always does.
"Everything okay?"
Simon has to hold back a humorless laugh, texting Sara that he'll be home in ten and to stay in her room.
"Yeah, just Sara wondering when I'll be home," Simon answers, seemingly unfazed, like a pit hasn't grown in his stomach. "I should probably get going actually."
There's little protest from Rosh, because he swears she has a sixth sense, and nothing but protests from Ayub - because it's Simon's turn next, because they barely see each other now that he goes to Hillerska, because he promises he'll get a second turn if he stays for just a little longer.
Simon bides his friend a farewell with a roll of his eyes and promises that he'll be back soon. Rosh sends him a look that would've broken his composure had he not been dealing with this life for the past 16 years.
He hears the screaming by the time he's three doors down, well-accustomed to being 'that house' on the block. 'That house' that, up until the new neighbor moved in six months ago, no one on the block speaks too. They talk a lot about them - the drug addict, the battered wife, the two traumatized children - but in the four years they've lived here, no one has ever tried to actually speak to them.
He'll catch their stares mixed with pity, fear, or judgement and realize just how often people look at him like that.
At school it’s because he's 'poor', in his neighborhood it’s because he's the kid with a drunk dad - there's constant eyes on him but no one's ever brave enough to talk to him.
Not until Erik, the nice but obviously well-off neighbor who Simon couldn't help but be curious about.
It's clear when people come from money, something in the way they talk and present themselves, and then hearing him confess to being a Hillerska alumni himself, so he can't help but wonder why he's here. Why he's the only one who's kindly acknowledged him and Sara with, greeted his mother with a fruit basket, and saw through the facade that Micke put up when he tried to make the first impression of a loving, family man.
"If you guys ever need anything, my door is always open, Linda."
They have yet to accept the invitation. Simon's unsure if they ever will.
~
"Are you gonna tell me what happened?"
The two brothers have been having a silent stand-off in the kitchen for almost an hour now. The house tour and casual dinner out of the way left them with little to talk about except the elephant in the room, although Wilhelm was desperately trying to put it off. That should be Erik's sign to drop it, and usually he would, but a part of him feels like he can't. Wilhelm's energy is too... off right now. And intense.
Wille's always been a little intense but it's scaring Erik tonight.
The younger boy's gaze is glassy, looking everywhere but Erik as he takes in the small house and cozy decor. He doesn't wanna talk about it, about her, but knows he owes his brother an explanation. He showed up to his home unannounced, like a storm, and settled himself into his guest room.
"Wille, I don't mind that you're here. You know that," Erik says, always the first person to open his home to others and especially his brother. "But, please, you gotta give me something. Even just a small something. I need to know what happened."
Wille's tooth is sunken into his lip, picking at the skin on his red flesh, before he brings his finger up to chew on his nail. They're bitten down to the nub, each and every one, with cuticles so ragged, they have to burn.
"Wilhelm..."
It's Erik's sympathy, his sadness, it's him trying to be patient but Wilhelm just can't right now.
He can't.
His mother had done worse things to him in the past and it didn't cause this type of reaction but, for some reason, it felt greater tonight. It felt like everything built up over the past 16 years of his life and hit him after one snarky little comment that usually would've went over his head. There was just too much pressure and hostility, too much of an icy, hateful gaze from someone who birthed him. Who was supposed to love him.
Someone who should make him feel like living is worth it and not making it more and more difficult each day.
"Erik-"
His voice breaks and he doesn't even feel embarrassed. He just feels weak and defeated, like he can't do anything right or help the one and only person he knows cares about him.
Tears gather in his eyes and he'd feel guilty for the way his brother's face drops if the pressure in his chest wasn't so tight. If his heart wasn't starting to race and it didn't feel like there was a ton of bricks sitting on his chest.
"Wilhelm, breathe, it's okay."
But it's not okay. He's scared. He's had... thoughts like that before but never longer than a few minutes.
He never started making a plan, considering how much better he'd feel, how much more at ease he and everyone else would be, if he just wasn't here anymore. If he just went into his father's locked safe where he knew weapons were or locked himself in the bathroom where he could just-
He's met with Erik's chest where he just seems to completely break down again, collapsing against his brother's sweater and soaking it with his tears.
Breathy sobs and whimpered pleas of "no," that cause the oldest's throat to close up, tears burning the back of his eyes. He may not know what happened but he knows what his younger brother is begging him not to do.
"You don't have to go back, Wille, I would never make you go back."
Because Erik can promise him that.
He can't promise him a lot of things - like he's gonna love it here or the habits he picked up whilst living alone won't annoy him or he's not gonna eventually need to know what happened to bring him here - but he can promise him that he'd never, ever make him go home.
It's a spoken promise that keeps Wilhelm up well until Erik went to bed, sitting on the couch alone with the tv humming lowly in the background.
The house is decorated more modern than he expected, none of the traditional pieces or antiques like at their family house anywhere in sight; he supposes that's the point. Between that and the new scent of homey lavender, Wilhelm is the most relaxed he's been in God knows how long.
Under a blanket, fire crackling, a house so quiet, you could hear a pin drop - until there seems to be what only can be described as a roar coming from outside, a yell so deep and guttural, he doesn't doubt half of the block heard it as well.
Wilhelm's not nosy by nature, he knows all too well the importance of a person's privacy at home, but it's also the type of yell that scares him. Would probably trigger him, if it was more sardonic and feminine.
He only gets up to peek out the kitchen window when he hears the roar again followed by a different masculine voice, loud, too, but also somehow soft, before the clash of a screen door swinging open cracks against brick.
Wilhelm watches as a boy with curls and a small frame flies down the stairs, face only lit by the moon and Erik's singular porch light; even through mostly darkness, the tension radiating off of him is obvious.
His hands wound into his hair, twisting the strands through his fingertips before the messy curls spring back to life. His chest is heaving, feet pacing, before he just seems to stop. With his face now dropped into his hands, the distress just as clear as it is disturbing to witness, Wilhelm can't tear his gaze away.
He knows it's wrong to stare, even more wrong to stare when someone's having an emotional moment in their own backyard, but for reasons unknown to him, he's stuck in place. Watching right through the window as the boy takes a few breaths, running his hands up through his curls again, before plopping down on the stairs.
The stranger looks young, probably around his age, but so defeated. How can people like them, people so young and supposedly care free, carry such a palpable sadness to them?
"Wille?"
The sound of his name makes him jump, cheeks flushing as he cranes his neck back to look at Erik; he's caught like a peeping Tom and now he's really seeing just how wrong it was to continue his snooping.
The older man looks confused but also intrigued, making his way over to Wille with a raised eyebrow. He catches the moment Erik sees what grabbed his attention, him, too, probably awoken by the ruckus of fighting and slamming doors.
"That fucking guy..." he hears Erik mumble, Wilhelm looking at him with a questioning gaze.
"You know him?"
Erik bites the inside of his cheek before nodding. Wilhelm swears he's not a gossiper but he feels something like relief when Erik decides to answer.
"Neighbors kid. Simon. He's your age," he responds, Wille following his gaze back to the boy on the stairs. His head is out of his hands but he still carries that tension, that worry, that oh so prevalent anxiety in his shoulders.
"Was he the one yelling?"
He finds it hard to believe someone that small could sound like that. Sympathy and pity swarm in Erik's eyes, backing himself and Wille away from the window before closing the blinds.
"No, that'd be his piece of shit dad. Happens almost every night," Erik says, his voice low but holding nothing but contempt. "He has a mom and sister, too. Linda and Sara. They're both sweet. Simon is too, although quiet."
Wille doesn't know what to say or ask. He doesn't know if he even wants to given Erik's words and tone but he knows he feels concerned for Simon and his family.
The question falls from his mouth before he can even stop it.
"Are they okay?"
The only thing worse than him not asking is Erik's silence that follows, eyes shifting from his to the wall behind him. He thinks that's where the clock is ticking from.
"You should go to bed, Wille. It's been a long day, no? You can make me breakfast tomorrow."
A smile attempts to pull at his lips but his feet don't yet wanna move, something deep within him pulling him toward the window. Just to look out for a few more seconds, make sure the yelling really has stopped or no one's followed the boy outside.
Erik can see the look in his brother's eyes and sighs, shaking his head as he gently guides Wille by the shoulder.
"Bed. Now."
The commanding, brotherly tone is just enough to distract Wille, eyes narrowing at the taller man. Wilhelm might've grown a few inches but Erik's still got height over him.
"I'm not a child, you know."
"Could've fooled me," Erik bites back, that ghost of a smile lighting up Wille's face.
It's while Erik's getting water for both of them, distracted by the light banter back and forth, that Wille peeks between the slightly dusty white blinds. His gaze travels over the backyard to see its empty now, just a dark, eerie silence falling over the block.
He doesn't know why, can't even begin to wonder or question why his brain is thinking the things it is tonight, but he hopes to see Simon again. There was something about him that was hauntingly familiar, probably the sadness and frustration that crushes him daily, and Wille wants to help him.
He always wants to help people in ways he can't help himself.